Global Teacher Prize
The 10 finalists are:
• Azizullah Royesh, Marefat High School, Kabul.
• Kiran Bir Sethi, The Riverside School, Ahmedabad, India.
• Guy Etienne, College Catts Pressoir, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
• Jacqueline Jumbe-Kahura, Bofa Primary school, Kilifi, Kenya.
• Nancie Atwell, The Center for Teaching and Learning, Edgecomb, Maine.
• Naomi Volain, Springfield Central High School, Springfield, Mass.
• Phalla Neang, Phnom Penh Thmey, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
• Madenjit Singh, GDI-SOLS 247 School (in Cambodia), Malaysia.
• Richard Spencer, Middlesbrough College, Middlesbrough, United Kingdom.
• Stephen Ritz, Public School 55, Bronx, N.Y.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A few years ago, a group of high school students attending the modest, privately run College Catts Pressoir came up with an innovative thought for their physics final: They would get a broken traffic light down the street to work again.
After studying how traffic lights work, they installed an inverter operated by 10 batteries in their classroom and ran an electrical cable to the nearby four-way intersection. Weeks later, at the corner of John Brown and Martin Luther King, the lights came alive.
“Difficulties are the ingredients of development,” said school headmaster and chemistry teacher Guy Etienne, recalling the day the lights came on. “What we are developing in students’ minds is that when you are confronted with a challenge, go find a solution; don’t just cross your arms and say you can’t because it’s difficult.”
That empowering philosophy has made Catts Pressoir one of Haiti’s most prestigious private schools. It also has given Etienne the biggest recognition yet of his 34-year teaching career: He is among 10 finalists for a $1 million award that is considered the “Nobel Prize for teaching.”